


Son of Bat and Bug

by TheUltimateFanGirl7



Category: Batman - All Media Types, Miraculous Ladybug
Genre: Alternate Eye Color, Badass Marinette Dupain-Cheng | Ladybug, Confused Parentage, F/M, Genius Marinette Dupain-Cheng | Ladybug, Guardian Marinette Dupain-Cheng, League of Assassins Sabine Cheng, Marinette Dupain-Cheng | Ladybug is Called MDC, Mom Marinette Dupain-Cheng, Post-Hawk Moth Defeat, Tilting Worldview, briefly, previously
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-07-24
Updated: 2020-07-24
Packaged: 2021-03-04 23:08:26
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,886
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25494382
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheUltimateFanGirl7/pseuds/TheUltimateFanGirl7
Summary: Ladybug was a hero. Heroes aren’t meant to kidnap children. But they also aren’t supposed to leave children in a very clearly unhealthy environment.Alternatively: Tikki mentions some stupid water and Marinette inadvertently adopts a tiny murderous Wayne.
Relationships: Luka Couffaine/Kagami Tsurugi, Marinette Dupain-Cheng | Ladybug & Damian Wayne, Marinette Dupain-Cheng | Ladybug/Bruce Wayne, Penny Rolling/Jagged Stone
Comments: 32
Kudos: 567





	Son of Bat and Bug

**Author's Note:**

> I know I have a bunch of other stories I should be updating, but I really couldn’t help myself. Also, I was stuck in the car for a few hours the other day and staring blankly out the window can only entertain a person for so long.
> 
> If you can help a child, you don’t have to spend years repairing a adult.
> 
> Chow for now ~TheUltimateFanGirl7

Screams echoed in her ears as she clutched her stomach, trying in vain to be rid of the pain of the knife in her gut. She was shaking, she knew, and all she could see was shadows and blood. So much blood. She could hear her teammates- her family- crying out in the background as they fell one by one. She looked up into the eyes of her killer- her betrayer. The toxic green eyes of the man she once thought she loved looked back at her with a sinister gleam, mouth twisted in a horrible mockery of a smile. With one hand he reached out to caress her face as she looked at him through tear filled eyes, her eyesight fading as her life slowly left her body with every stream of blood that escaped through her fingers. She looked away to cough up a bubble of blood that burst past her lips and she spat it at his feet. She glared up at him weakly one last time as the world finally went dark.

\§/ \§/ \§/

Marinette sat up gasping, hand automatically going down to hover over the non-existent wound there, phantom pangs pulsing after the dream, no, the memory. Every few nights since that horrible day when her partner betrayed her and stood by while his father murdered her. She was only alive today because her mother had been watching the fight from the window of the bakery and had watched her daughter die, the transformation falling with the loss of its host. According to reports from her father and surviving teammates, Sabine Cheng had immediately grabbed a knife from the kitchen and raced out with a scream, the knife in Chat Noir’s heart before anyone had really grasped what was happening. She took Ladybug’s earrings from her daughter’s cooling corpse and took charge of the battle without hesitance. Andrenidae and Kit Fox were the only two still capable of fighting, Tatsu the only other alive, and they followed her without hesitation, intent on avenging their fallen teammates, their fallen friends - fallen family.

She’d been told it was a long battle, but in the end Lady Luck ripped Hawkmoth’s Miraculous from him. By this point only Lady Luck still wore her Miraculous transformation, the other two long having dropped them in order to not have to deal with the hassle and danger of recharging while their partners fought on without them. Andrenidae secured him with handcuffs one particularly brave police officer had approached with. Kit Fox took the cat ring from Adrien Agreste’s corpse and likewise secured him with cuffs. Then Lady Luck cast her cure and the city jerked back to life, over ten million people sitting up gasping for breath and sobbing in relief. The few who had survived and been in the area of Ladybug’s last stand and Lady Luck’s debut and victory collectively vowed their silence on what had truly happened and their saviors’ identities.

The next day, Paris shut down. No outsiders were allowed in. Any Parisian citizen that had lived in the city during the last decade was called back. City officials discretely brought in thousands of the best psychologists in the world, having them sign stacks upon stacks of discretion papers and arranging for the city en masse to receive extensive therapy. After ten years of repressing emotions, of dying over and over again, of watching loved ones die over and over again, of being controlled and seeing others controlled, the citizens of Paris needed help. Help they were finally able to receive. Group and single counseling sessions were set and no one went to work for months. Necessity delivering was arranged by the city and a group of volunteers. Heading and funding these efforts were the mayor’s daughter Chloe Bourgeois, Olympic fencer Tsurugi Kagami and her mother Tomoe, pop star Clara Nightingale, Chinese chef Wang Cheng, world famous rock star Jagged Stone and his wife Penny Rolling-Stone, and Jagged’s son and Kagami’s fiancé Luka Coffaine. Rumors even said that the elusive designer MDC had joined the efforts.

Ten years after that, Marinette Dupain-Cheng, former Ladybug and current Guardian, finally decided to leave Paris. She needed to be able to heal in a place that wasn’t full of so many horrible memories, and she needed to complete her duties as Guardian and maintain the balance in the world. It had started tilting after the fall of the temple and she needed to undo the damage and begin rebuilding the order. So, one day, she gathered together her old team and family and explained her mission to them. They were sad to see her go and to separate from their Kwami, but they understood. Chloe - Andrenidae - was the first to give, handing over the bee comb, her eyes glistening with unshed tears. Kagami - Tatsu - was next; to any outsider she would have appeared cold and indifferent as she handed over the dragon choker, but her friends - her family - could see the sorrow she hid beneath her icy demeanor. Her mother stood behind her, a hand on her daughter’s shoulder in silent support, for she didn’t need sight to know it was needed. Luka - Naga - handed over his with his fiancé, wrapping his arm around her waist as he fought tears. Jagged and Penny - Kit Fox and Tigress - walked up together, leaning into each other as they cried. Sabine - Phoenix - was last, smiling sadly as she handed her daughter the rooster ring.

As Chat had grown flaky and Marinette drew closer to Hawkmoth’s identity and further from her classmates, she’d been forced to seek aid from the few people she still trusted. To Chloe, Kagami, and Luka, whom she had fought with before and who had become her only friends the longer Lila reigned, she gave the bee, dragon, and snake. She knew Hawkmoth knew their identities, so she had them forge new ones and used the Fox to draw away suspicion. To her honorary aunt and uncle, she gave the tiger and the Fox. After her mother fought in her place in the final battle, she gave her the rooster. Their team of seven - with Marinette wielding the two Miraculous of balance as Lady Chat - vigilantly watched over Paris throughout its years of recovery. Now, it was time for the Miraculous to vanish into the pages of a history book.

Preparations for the battle against Hawkmoth had forced them to undergo extreme training, and Sabine had trained with a remote group of warriors when she was young and traveling the world to find herself. Now that Marinette was leaving, her team would take to the streets as vigilantes. Marinette had created reinforced, armored suits vaguely reminiscent of their Miraculous suits, and Kagami and her mother had subtly arranged for weapons and other tools. Chloe had chosen a whip woven of Kevlar and steel threads with an iron ball braided into the end. Kagami chose a katana and Luka followed in a similar pattern with a pair of short swords. Jagged had a pair of escrima sticks that reminded him of his flute as Kit Fox, while Penny had gloves with platinum claws sewn in the finger tips and a dagger strapped to her thigh. Sabine chose a simple bow, but with it a variety of arrows. They shed their hero names, instead becoming Gadfly, Samurai, Viper, Nighthawk, Panther, and Glory. Their suits were all black with a few strips of dark color. They ordered gadgets such as communication devices, advanced computer systems, a full med bay, smoke shields, knockout gas, etc. etc. everything a vigilante team could need.

The former Ladybug stayed in her broken-but-getting-there city for a few weeks after that, watching as her former team took to the streets in their new get-ups. It was a new age in Paris. One that she wouldn’t be a part of.

}|{ }|{ }|{

Marinette spent many years traveling the globe. She always kept Tikki and Plagg active, in order to help her fix the balance, but the rest of the Kwami spent most of her travels asleep in the miracle box, which resembled an antique jewelry box she easily passed off as a gift from her departed grandmother. The only time she returned to Paris was to celebrate her thirty-fifth birthday. She’d been traveling for two years then, and had already been to so many different places. She stayed with her family only a week before heading out again. A month after that she found herself hiking through the Himalayan Mountains in an attempt to find some sort of hidden temple apparently holding a pool of water. Why was she out here, in the cold, at night, looking for hidden and probably very well protected water? Well it turned out that the first thing Tikki ever created was this stupid glow-y pool of green water capable of healing any wound and even resurrecting the dead at the cost of the soul. Because a murderous body was apparently desired. When she’d mentioned the mission during lunch with her mother one day, Sabine had gotten an odd look in her eyes but had waved off Marinette’s concerns when she had asked.

When she finally arrived at the temple, she transformed with Plagg and woke Kaalki. Using Kaalki’s portals and Tikki’s luck, along with the night vision and extra stealth with the cat Miraculous, she was able to make it to the chamber of stupid miracle water rather easily. It was conveniently unoccupied. A few muttered words in the Guardian language had it begin roiling. Bubbles began appearing on the surface and popping. Before long, the entire pool began to evaporate into a green steam that vanished into thin air about a meter above the pit that used to be the pool.

Of course the bad luck of Plagg decided to finally show up at this point. She nodded once in satisfaction at the not-anymore-a-stupid-pool-of-magic-resurrection-water and turned around, only to find a black-garbed child glaring up at her and a sword at her throat. A sword being held by the child. She narrowed her eyes at it, before shifting her gaze to meet the boy’s.

“Who are you?” He demanded. “What did you do to the Lazarus Pit?”

She blinked at him. Huh. Luckily she knew Arabic.

“Is that what that monstrosity was called?” She asked. Dragging a hand down her face she sighed. “Look, kid-“

“Damien.” He interrupted. She raised an eyebrow at him in response to the interruption before continuing.

“Damien, then, that thing was a horrible accident that never should have existed in the first place.”

He only glared harder in response. She sighed again, looking around briefly at the room that was empty except for her and the kid. Wait. Kid. From what she’d been able to discern on her adventure through the temple, this place was inhabited by assassins. And only assassins. Heck! The kid was holding a freaking sword for Tikki’s sake! She could not in good conscious leave him - Damien - behind. With a glance at Kaalki, a portal was opened directly behind the kid. She stepped forward quickly, pushing the sword away with one hand and the kid back into the portal with the other. Just as she did so, a dark haired, green eyed woman flanked by two cloaked men strode into the room. Meeting the woman’s slightly widened eyes and smirking, she stepped through the portal after him.

/§\ /§\ /§\

She arrived in the kitchen of the small house she’d been renting in the area. The kid - she should really start calling him Damien because she had the sinking suspicion that he’d be around for a while - stood near stock still in the middle of the room, his only movements being to follow Tikki with his head as she flew around the room. The sword was held lax at his side as he watched her in wide-eyed wonder. Marinette observed him with a small smile as she let her transformation fall away, Plagg flying over to hover in the- Damien’s face. He blinked and slowly brought the hand not holding the sword up to pet Plagg. The normally grumpy and rude Kwami allowed it, before deciding to nest in the kid’s hair and purr up a storm. Marinette rolled her eyes, walking over and pulling the sword from his grip while he was distracted in a practiced move (Luka had been ever so helpful when getting Kagami to stop her training). She immediately placed it on the counter nearest to him before walking to the far side - but admittedly very close, this was a very small room - of the kitchen to begin preparing snacks for the three Kwami who had helped her infiltrate the temple. She would have liked to keep the dang thing as far away from the child as possible, but she knew that that would likely be a bad idea. She could easily connect the dots - that green eyed woman was clearly someone important to the secret order inhabiting the temple, and by the fact that her eyes were a near perfect match to Damien’s she suspected she was his mother, meaning he had likely been raised to kill and she had just stolen him away from all he knew. Taking his weapon from him completely would be a bad idea.

/§\ /§\ /§\

The next year was... difficult. She learned that he was seven when she rescued him, and he was apparently the heir of the... League of Assassins, which was apparently the name of the group she’d taken him from. She’d had to ward off several (and by several she means many... a day... for months...) attempts to kill her, and only slightly fewer attempts to escape. This was made even more challenging by the fact that she had to keep moving during this time in order to stop his mother (and she uses that word /very/ lightly regarding that woman) or her minions from tracking them down, killing her, and taking the boy back. She also had to deal with the fact that apparently a side affect of standing over stupid-green-pool-of-stupidness as it evaporated had turned her eyes permanently the same green as the water. This was only convenient because it happened to be the same green as Damien’s eyes and made playing mother-son when traveling much easier. As possible as it was for children to be the spitting image of only one parent, there was usually some traits of the other. Damien looked nothing like her until the green finally set in, and some people always seemed doubtful when she had tried to stutter out a weak ‘adopted?’. Which she really couldn’t blame them for.

Eventually, she was finally able to drill it into him that what they had done to him and how he was raised was wrong on so many levels it wasn’t anywhere near funny. She explained that children are meant to be raised with love and kindness, and that killing is very wrong. When she managed to get the point across to him, he calmed down and began traveling with her more willingly, no longer attempting to escape or kill her. A few months after that development, she finally got around to explaining the Kwami, Miraculous, and her mission to him. He always seemed mesmerized by them when they were out, and they seemed likewise taken with him, so she resigned herself to just keeping them out full time.

About a month before she turned thirty-eight, she took Damien to Paris to meet her family. When they were stood outside Chloe’s home where Marinette had agreed to meet up with the others, Damien surprised her by taking her hand and looking up at her nervously - some of the first genuine emotion she had seen from him - and asking,

“Are you sure they’ll like me, Mother?”

She’d blinked at him for a moment, wide eyed, blindsided by being called mother by the boy she’d rescued (kidnapped) and took a moment to stutter out an answer. She smiled blindingly - the first time since roughly three years into Hawkmoth’s reign over Paris, nearly three decades ago - and swept him into a joyful hug, ignoring how he tensed. (She’d have to fix that reaction - more hugs to come.)

“Yes, Dami. They won’t be able to help but love you.”

/§\ /§\ /§\

There’d been a lot of explaining to do - mostly why her eyes were green and where the kid had come from - but everyone had been very accepting afterwards. Sabine had scanned him carefully, lingering on his eyes, before giving her daughter a strangely knowing look and sweeping the boy - her grandson - into a big hug before handing him off to Tom for the same treatment.

They spent a wonderful two months in Paris. The city had recovered so well you could hardly tell there had ever been a problem - though the nightmares would always remain lurking in the survivors’ minds. Tourism had recently picked up again, and business among citizens had resumed like normal before Hawkmoth.

Marinette had decided to head for Gotham next. The entire city was one big miasma of bad fortune that needed fixing, but she’d been putting it off because such a venture would not be a quick project like her other trips. This was something that would take years. But, as her mother had pointed out, and Luka and Kagami - who were expecting their first child - had supported, a child needed a stable environment to grow up in. The constant moving around they’d done wasn’t healthy. Stationing herself in Gotham would give him a chance to grow. In addition, Damien had confided in her when she told him she was considering Gotham that Batman was his father. This solidified her decision. Damien deserved to know his father, even if said father was a wacko who dressed as a bat to go punch people at night. Not that she could judge. At least he was probably a better parent than Talia.

Before they left, Sabine gifted Damien her Glory bow set. She explained that she was too old to continue her work as a vigilante, but Damien’s father was one, and his adopted mother would no doubt end up taking up a mantel not to long after arrival in Gotham. Sabine had no doubt the boy would follow in his parents’ footsteps. Besides, she explained to him, it was a part of his legacy. He’d accepted the gift with a reverent look in his eyes and gave her an awkward hug. She’d only smiled in response, humming gently as she patted him on the back.

/§\ /§\ /§\

Marinette ended up opening a cafe on one of Gotham’s nicer streets, only a few blocks away from Wayne Enterprises. The Kwami homeschooled Damien in the apartment they lived in above the shop. She spent her days slipping customers potions disguised inside various drinks and pastries. Two months into her business, she added various soups and salads to the menu, increasing her patronage with the people who’d stop in for lunch but hadn’t ever wanted a coffee or scone or any other such thing. As a new Gothamite she paid particularly close attention to Gotham news, even scouring the internet for important archived news from the past few years. Now, Marinette was by no means an idiot. She had actually skipped several grades before being placed in a school for gifted children. Had she ever been officially tested, she no doubt would have been measured a genius. So it was really no effort at all to look at a single picture of a Bruce Wayne and notice the striking resemblance he had to Damien. A closer look at old records showed a new Robin showing up shortly after he adopted another child. Plus, he was certainly rich enough to afford the equipment a vigilante required. There was no doubt in her mind that Bruce Wayne was Batman. Which was just wonderful. She was illegally the guardian of a billionaire’s child he no doubt didn’t know about and said child was his spitting image if not for the different eye color. She resigned herself to keeping Damien out of sight at all times until she found a way to alert M. Wayne to the existence of his son.

This was made especially difficult when Tim Drake-Wayne became a regular of her cafe.

/§\ /§\ /§\

In the end, the decision was taken out of her hands when a group of idiots decided to try and rob her cafe. Drake-Wayne was sitting at his usual corner table, one with a perfect view of the entire cafe and the street out the window (she’d definitely not re-arranged the cafe a week after she noticed his repeated visits, whatever would give you that impression?), typing away at who knows what on that laptop he always brought with him, an XXXL cup of triple caffeinated espresso sitting next to him when the window crashed to the floor, the gunmen stepping through, their thick boots crunching on the broken glass shards. She had no doubt he’d call in the bats, so she just had to stall for time. And /pray/ that Damien didn’t come downstairs.

She managed the first by screaming and ranting at the increasingly bewildered robbers about the mess they’d made on her beautiful hard wood floors. Unfortunately, the second didn’t go anywhere near as well. Batman and Nightwing had arrived and taken down the robbers, Nightwing stood off in Tim’s corner speaking quietly with him, while Batman himself questioned her (and she had to try really hard not to act shifty, which was made harder by the fact that she couldn’t stop thinking that /this man’s son/ was upstairs, in her home, after she’d kidnapped him from admittedly horrible people). Batman seemed to be wrapping up his questioning and hadn’t /seemed/ to find anything off with her, but this was Batman so she really had no clue, no matter how smart and observant she was. Of course, this was when the universe decided to laugh in her face.

“Mother?” She heard from behind her.

She stiffened and turned around slowly, only to find that, yes, Damien was indeed standing in the doorway of the staircase connecting her cafe to their apartment. And oh yes, would you look at that: both Nightwing and Drake-Wayne are staring at him slack-jawed. Nightwing glanced at Batman, her (more specifically her eyes) and then to Damien and repeat. Batman appeared to have frozen in place.

Marinette sighed resignedly, scrubbing her face with her hands.

“Damien...” she muttered tiredly. To his credit he did look a bit sheepish.

“My apologies, Mother, Father. I will retreat upstairs now.” And spinning on his heel that’s exactly what he did. Marinette glared after him.

Observing that there was no one else in the cafe besides her and the bats, she sighed again and turned to Batman who was apparently staring at her intently.

“M. Wayne,” she said, intentionally letting her French accent thicken and ignoring the stiffening of his children and the narrowing of his eyes, “If you have the time, you are more than welcome to join us upstairs. Clearly we have a lot to talk about. If now doesn’t work Tim has my number, just call and we can set up a time to meet.”

With that she turned and trudged her way upstairs after Damien.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks to bbgirl3191 to Beta-ing for me!
> 
> Gadfly: Chloe:  
> Black cat suit with a dark golden stripe running vertically up each side (from ankle up leg to arm pit, then also on each side of the arm so as if continues when arms straight at side) she wore a scarf-esque covering on her mouth and a black hood shadowed her face - no actual mask, black knee high stiletto boots with matching stripe, black gloves
> 
> Samurai: Kagami:  
> Loose black ‘shirt’ with blood red slashed diagonally from right shoulder to left hip, long sleeved, tight at wrist, puffing slightly down arm, black gloves, tight black pants, black knee high flat foot boots, hair in pony tail, black mask with points down to chin and completely covers for head, eye cover things blood red
> 
> Viper: Luka:  
> Black cat suit with dark green accents on shoulders and from knee down, black combat boots with dark green buckles, dark green gloves with black pads, black domino mask with dark green eye over things
> 
> Nighthawk: Jagged:  
> Black cat suit with dark purple-blue 4-in wide stripe across chest, black boots and gloves, black domino mask
> 
> Panther: Penny:  
> Black body suit with dark grey high collar and gloves, dark grey accents, platinum claws, black mask with cat ears, heeled black knee high boots
> 
> Glory: Sabine:  
> Nyssa from Arrow but replace red with dark orange and give her a pointy black mask with dark orange outline around eyes and mask
> 
> I’d also like to mention that I love when Marinette has blue eyes, it hurts me to take them away, but it needed to happen for plot reasons..


End file.
